The Tokyo Foundation eNewsletter 67 (June 23, 2016)

Takeo Hoshi, the Henri and Tomoye Takahashi Senior Fellow in Japanese Studies at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University, has been named the Tokyo Foundation's new Chair of the Board, replacing President Masahiro Akiyama. Hoshi is an internationally renowned authority on the Japanese economy, monetary policy, corporate governance, and financial regulation. Before joining Stanford University in 2012, Hoshi was the Pacific Economic Cooperation Professor of International Economic Relations at the Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies (IR/PS), UC San Diego, where he also served as the chair of the university's Sylff Steering Committee.

The ideal shape of corporate social responsibility is for companies to contribute to the resolution of social issues through their normal business operations, playing a role that fiscally constrained governments are increasingly having a difficult time fulfilling. This is part two of the Tokyo Foundation eNewsletter report on the ongoing research into the evolving shape of CSR and the pioneering companies that are setting an example for others to follow.

"Japanese Corporate Management and CSR"

More than a decade has passed since Japanese companies actively began implementing initiatives under the "corporate social responsibility" banner. But the meaning of this concept is still not well understood, and relatively few companies consider it to be a core element of corporate management. Corporate CSR departments, says Keiichi Ushijima, should not just keep abreast of new regulations but also ensure that management adapts to society in areas transcending the regulatory framework so as to achieve sustainability for both the company and society.

Companies exist to fulfill certain social responsibilities and offer value for society. From that standpoint, notes Yoshihiko Takubo, "corporate social responsibility" is a concept that lies at the heart of corporate management. There is thus no need to talk about or undertake CSR initiatives as if they were something special.

With the help of the United Nations Environment Program, the Global Reporting Initiative was established in the United States in 1997 to provide international guidance on sustainability reporting. Naomichi Terasaki reports that this was the brainchild of Ceres, an environmental nonprofit organization, and the Tellus Institute, a research and policy NPO.

When CSR was "discovered" in Britain more than three decades ago, few people foresaw that it would evolve into the kind of broad, profound concept that it has become today. Over these years, CSR has emerged as an important tool companies use to fulfill their social responsibilities through their business activities. The task, says Takayuki Shoji, in looking "at where we need to focus for the future," will be to work out the internal contradictions, described above, that still remain unresolved.

Tsuneo Watanabe and Sota Kato, both senior fellows and directors of policy research at the Tokyo Foundation, discuss the big issues confronting the Shinzo Abe administration in an article originally published on May 25, 2016, as part of a Japan Times special supplement on the Group of Seven Ise-Shima Summit. Watanabe credits the prime minister with pursuing a realistic foreign policy aimed at elevating Japan’s international standing through "proactive contributions to international peace," while Kato warns against populist fiscal policies that may appeal to voters today but could saddle future generations with massive debts.

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